FOOD SECURITY FOR AFRICA; A SUSTAINABLE APPROACH.

A few years ago there were approximately 2 million people in Nairobi. Today the figure stands at around 8 million and the number is projected to be 8 million people living in Nairobi and its environs by 2030. The story is virtually the same across major urban cities in other African countries. This projected growth is due to rural-urban migration which involves the youth in most cases.

The rural areas have been left desolate with no one to do sustainable farming so that we can fully support the huge populations that are coming into the cities. The old men who have been left in the villages with huge tracts of arable land do not have the energy and adequate knowledge for practising modern farming which is the solution to our food challenge.

With the current population growth rate, Africa may not be able to sustain itself in terms of food security if nothing is done. And that security can be achieved by employing modern and sustainable forms of agriculture.

For instance, mechanization should be encouraged among farmers as a way of increasing efficiency and productivity. Instances, where human labor is used in most farming, should be replaced with machines which can do the work not only efficiently but also effectively, and with precision, especially during the fertilizer application and planting phases.

When it comes to harvesting, machines help lessen the work which thus saves time in harvesting and storage hence reducing the amount of food that goes to waste due to poor handling techniques. Irrigation should be at the forefront of our budgetary allocations to ensure enough wells are drilled in dry areas and water storage mechanisms are implemented to provide watering solutions for plants in such areas.

Farmers should also be trained on the types of seeds or varieties to plant in line with the specific soil type and weather conditions. Our research institutions such as KALRO (Kenya Agricultural and Livestock Research Organization) are doing research every day to try and determine the various varieties that can withstand various weather conditions and certain soils.

The tolerance limits of such crops help the researchers advise farmers accordingly which in turn helps reduce the number of losses incurred by the farmers practising archaic methods ignorantly. The problem however arises in that some of the farmers do not take the advice they are given and end up learning late when losses have already been incurred.

We need to enlighten our farmers about modern-age technologies used in farming and encourage them to embrace them in totality.

Nairobi for instance has lots of land in buildings tops which can be good areas for practicing sustainable gardening. Vegetable gardens, corn, wheat and even fodder can be grown in such places and as such can help boost agricultural produce locally and at institutional levels.

There is nothing funny in trying this new idea which later on or soon could be the trend. The issue of land fragmentation in most African countries should desist if we are to make progress in terms of large-scale farming which will be needed in a few years to come too so that enough can be produced to sustain our numbers.

Having many herds of low-quality cattle is not doing us any good. Instead having a few quality herds of cattle can earn lots of income and reduce the effects such low-value cows contribute to soil erosion which affects the quality of soil and agricultural produce.

We have the potential to be a solution to our problems in terms of food security only if we can employ proper agricultural and sustainable farming techniques. Let our farmers be empowered on this and our story will begin to change.